Biography

German writer, son of the famous writer Thomas Mann. Mann's early life was troubled. His homosexuality often made him the target of bigotry, and he had a difficult relationship with his father. Mann's most famous novel, Mephisto, was written in 1936 and first published in Amsterdam. The novel is a thinly-disguised portrait of his former brother-in-law, the actor Gustaf Gründgens. Mann became a US citizen in 1943. During World War II, he served as a Staff Sergeant of the 5th US Army in Italy and in summer 1945 he was sent by the Stars and Stripes to report from Postwar-Germany.

In the post-war years he suffered from depression and died on 21 May 1949 in Cannes of an overdose of sleeping pills.